Aharonov-Bohm interferences from local deformations in graphene

One of the most interesting aspects of graphene is the close relation between its structural and electronic properties. The observation of ripples both in free-standing graphene and in samples on a substrate has given rise to active investigation of the membrane-like properties of graphene, and the origin of the ripples remains one of the most interesting open problems concerning this system. The interplay of structural and electronic properties is successfully described by the modelling of curvature and elastic deformations by fictitious gauge fields. These fields have become an experimental reality after the observation of the Landau levels that can form in graphene due to strain. Here we propose a device to detect microstresses in graphene based on a scanning-tunnelling-microscopy set-up able to measure Aharonov-Bohm interferences at the nanometre scale. The predicted interferences in the local density of states are created by the fictitious magnetic field associated with elastic deformations of the sample.